Birthright citizenship executive order signed by Trump challenged by lawsuits from California, ACLU
LOS ANGELES - Just a day after Trump was inaugurated, California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump Administration’s executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship.
Several immigrant rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of New Hampshire, ACLU of Maine, ACLU of Massachusetts, the Asian Law Caucus, State Democracy Defenders Fund, and the Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit against Trump. Seventeen other states, the District of Columbia and the city of San Francisco are also suing to block the executive order.
Under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, all children born on U.S. soil are automatically granted U.S. citizenship, regardless of their parents' immigration status.
The lawsuits argue that President Trump’s executive order violates the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and Section 1401 of the Immigration and Nationality Act and should be immediately blocked from going into effect.
"The President’s executive order attempting to rescind birthright citizenship is blatantly unconstitutional and quite frankly, un-American," said Attorney General Bonta.
RELATED: Trump executive action attempts to end birthright citizenship
"We are asking a court to immediately block this order from taking effect and ensure that the rights of American-born children impacted by this order remain in effect while litigation proceeds. The President has overstepped his authority by a mile with this order, and we will hold him accountable."
According to Bonta, the executive order would harm California and other states, causing them to risk federal funding for programs such as Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program."
These programs are conditioned on the citizenship and immigration status of the children they serve. In addition, states would be required — on little notice and at considerable expense — to immediately begin modifying their operation and administration of benefits programs to account for this change by February 19, when the order goes into effect," his statement read.
The executive order is part of Trump's larger goal of securing the border. He said he favored legal immigration as he signed orders declaring a national emergency on the U.S. border with Mexico, suspending refugee resettlement and ending automatic citizenship for anyone born in the United States.
Trump acknowledged an imminent legal challenge to overturning birthright citizenship and said automatic citizenship was "just ridiculous." He added that he believed he was on "good (legal) ground" to change it.
This was just one of many executive orders Trump signed on Monday.
RELATED: States sue to block Trump's executive order on birthright citizenship
Other states who have joined the lawsuit include New Jersey, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin.